Tit for tat: Argentina court orders Maduro’s arrest for crimes against humanity
Hours after Venezuela’s top court ordered the arrest of Argentina’s president, an Argentinian federal court ordered the immediate arrest of Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro and of his regime’s number two man, Diosdado Cabello, for alleged crimes against humanity.
The order, issued late Monday, came several hours after the Venezuelan Supreme Court ordered the arrest of Argentinian president Javier Milei and two other senior members of his government for charges related to the seizure of a Venezuelan cargo plane in Buenos Aires.
Argentinian judges Pablo Bertuzzi, Leopoldo Bruglia and Mariano Llorens ordered that the arrest warrants be sent to Interpol for the immediate detention and extradition of both Venezuelan officials.
The decision issued by the federal court of the City of Buenos Aires is part of a case introduced in early 2023 by the Argentine Forum for the Defense of Democracy based on the principle of universal jurisdiction, which allows countries to prosecute serious crimes against human rights regardless of where they were committed.
According to the plaintiffs, Maduro and Cabello, among others, have implemented a systematic plan of repression since 2014 that involves forced disappearances, torture, homicides and persecution of dissidents.
The forum described the order against Maduro and Cabello as historic.
“From now on, Maduro has become a fugitive from justice and the world has become increasingly smaller for those who have committed atrocious crimes,” forum general secretary Elisa Trotta said in a statement.
Both Maduro and Cabello are also being sought by the U.S. justice system on drug-trafficking charges; the U.S. State Department currently offers a $15 million reward for the capture Maduro and $10 million for Cabello. A bill introduced last week in the U.S. Senate aims to increase the reward for Maduro to $100 million.
The order comes just a week after a fact-finding mission created by the United Nations Human Rights Council to document human rights violations in Venezuela issued a grave warning about the repression taking place in the country following July’s contested presidential election.
“We are witnessing an intensification of the repressive apparatus of the State.... Although this is a continuation of previous patterns, the recent repression, due to its intensity and systematic nature, represents a very serious attack on the fundamental rights of the Venezuelan people,” said mission president Marta Valiñas when she presented the group’s latest report.
Following accusations that Maduro committed fraud in the July 28th presidential election, his regime launched a brutal crackdown on dissidents and opposition figures that has led to the arrest of at least 2,000 people and the death of at least 25 protesters, while a significant number of people have been reported as victims of forced disappearances.
Earlier on Monday, Maduro’s top court ordered the arrest of Milei for alleged crimes related to the seizure in 2022 of a Venezuelan cargo plane belonging to the Caracas regime.
The court, an entity tightly controlled by the Nicolas Maduro regime, also ordered the arrests of Karina Milei, the sister of the president who serves as secretary general of the presidency, and of Security Minister Patricia Bullrich.
The aircraft in question, a Boeing 747-300M, was initially detained in Argentina in June 2022, with Venezuelan and Iranian crew members suspected of being involved in espionage. Weeks later the U.S. government moved to take possession of it based on violations of U.S. sanctions on Venezuela. After months of diplomatic wrangling, the Boeing 747 was finally flown from Buenos Aires International Airport to South Florida on Feb. 12 of this year.
The Venezuelan Supreme Court has repeatedly been accused by international organizations of acting more as an instrument of political persecution than as an independent entity dedicated to the administration of justice.
